Early call centers were structured around handling voice calls, which may have been inbound, outbound, or combination of inbound/outbound calls. While voice calls are a common way of engaging with customers, modern call centers now handle many other types of communication channels. In addition to voice, various data oriented channels (i.e., non-voice) may be supported, such as email, texts (SMS), social media, fax, and web-based chat. Furthermore, call centers managing these additional channel types are now usually called “contact centers” to reflect that they support many different methods of engaging with customers, as opposed to only handling voice-type calls.
Today's contact center agents are experienced in handling various channel types to engage a customer. The non-voice channels may demand less real-time attention from the agent when interacting on that channel as compared to a voice channel. For example, an agent interacting with a customer using email may pause after receiving it, perform an ancillary task, and carefully compose a response. It would not be unusual for an agent to respond to an email twenty minutes after receiving it. Further, a twenty minute response time is likely acceptable to the customer. However, voice channels typically demand a higher level of attention of the agent when interacting with a customer. For example, an agent may pause for a few seconds in response to a customer's question, but the agent is expected to carry on a real-time conversation with the customer. Waiting twenty minutes to respond to a customer inquiry on a voice call would not be acceptable.
Many agents today, as are many younger people, are experienced and sophisticated in performing simultaneous multiple tasks (“multi-tasking”), particularly when this involves interacting with a computer. Thus, it may be possible for an agent to engage in multiple simultaneous chat sessions with multiple customers. Or, engage in a voice call with one customer while interacting with another customer via email or some other non-voice channel.
Whenever an agent is interacting with a customer in a contact center, the agent typically has certain information presented to him or her on a computer screen to assist them with the communication. That information may include information about the customer's account, prior communications with the customer, current outstanding balance, etc. Presenting this information in an effective form to an agent handling multiple communication sessions is challenging. An effective human interface is critical maintaining agent productivity. Prior art solutions have presented simultaneous detailed information about each communication session to the agent, which can cause “information overload” to the agent. In order to present all of this detailed information, multiple display monitors may be required. However, using multiple display monitors is expensive and consumes more desk space than one monitor. Finally, requiring multiple monitors allows so much information to be displayed to the agent that it can be challenging for the agent to readily locate the needed information. On the other hand, using a single display monitory may display too much information, resulting in a “crowded” information display, where information is not logically arranged, difficult to find, and typically too small in size for quick review and comprehension.
Displaying too much information to the agent regarding multiple communication sessions can cause the agent to be overwhelmed, and can degrade the interaction the agent has with each corresponding customer associated with each communication session. Further, presenting too much information to the agent may make it difficult for the agent to readily find the information desired for a particular communication session. Because the agent can be expected to shift their attention from one communication session to another, the agent can be expected to require access to different contextual information in a quick and easy to use manner.
Interacting with multiple parties simultaneously using multiple communication channels or multiple sessions requires the agent's focused attention and concentration. Information about the status for each session can be displayed to the agent using their computer, but this may result in “information overload.” That is, status information about the voice session and the plurality of other non-voice session can be displayed to the agent, but it is possible that the status information may not be readily observed by the agent. Or, there may be limited display space (so-called “real-estate”) on the display monitor to present that information to the agent in a readily cognizable manner. Or, the agent may be distracted or focusing on a non-voice session content and may not be looking at the appropriate area of the display screen at a particular moment. While ever more information can be displayed on a computer display using smaller font, doing so creates further issues as to usability. Thus, providing the agent with information about the various multiple communication channels in an effective manner requires using various techniques so that the agent's attention is maintained, even while the agent may be distracted or looking away from the screen. It is with respect to these considerations and others that the disclosure herein is presented.
Thus, systems and methods are needed to provide information to the agent regarding multiple communication sessions, so that the agent can quickly ascertain what information is available for a communication session. The information may be presented aurally as well as visually. The information should be provided to the agent in an easy-to-use and intuitive manner, so as to minimize agent training time, to avoid interruption due to distractions, and generally provide greater agent efficiency in interacting with the system.